


Summer Storm

by FairestCat



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Community: sticksandsnark, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-09-16
Updated: 2008-09-16
Packaged: 2017-10-01 23:26:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,526
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/137
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FairestCat/pseuds/FairestCat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Teyla is hurt. Rodney is her comfort.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Summer Storm

**Author's Note:**

  * For [cottontail](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=cottontail).



> Written for [cottontail](http://cottontail.livejournal.com) for the [2007 Rodney/Teyla Thing-a-Thon.](http://community.livejournal.com/sticksandsnark/13419.html) She asked for Hurt/Comfort and close friendship. My brain has a funny idea of Hurt/Comfort, but I think this fits both prompts, at least loosely. Massive thanks to Marna for cheerleading and checking my grammar and promising me it doesn't suck.

It was raining, fat, heavy drops rolling down the windows in silence, as if the city itself were weeping. Idly, Teyla wished the Ancient engineering did not completely muffle the sound. The rain's steady, pounding rhythm had always soothed her, and she would welcome that comfort on this night.

A knock on the door startled her out of her reverie; there was only one person it could possibly be. Struggling to her feet, she pulled her robe close around her and limped to the door. It slid open at her touch. "Rodney," she said, composed smile fixed firmly in place, "please come in."

He looked strangely vulnerable, standing there, hand poised to knock again, and for a long moment she thought he would refuse, make some excuse and walk away, come back some other time when they were both less tired, but instead he stepped inside, words tumbling from his mouth, a counterpart to the unheard torrent falling from the sky outside. "Should you be standing on that knee? I know I heard Carson tell you not to put weight on it. Come on, sit down before you hurt yourself worse than those lunatics already did."

He reached out as if to help her back to bed and then stopped, wary of her bruised ribs or her state of undress, she couldn't be sure. She reached out to him instead, using his arm as a crutch, not letting go until she was settled again on the bed, her injured leg stretched out in front of her. He started talking again as they walked, a catalog of complaints and concerns she had heard many times before. As much as he might rant and complain about wasting his precious time, Rodney was never far away when one of his teammates was injured, always finding some excuse to hang around the infirmary until assured they would be fine. Except tonight, when he had slipped out silently, halfway through Carson's examination of her, with a muttered excuse about being needed to help install their new ZPM.

Teyla let his words wash over her, the ebb and flow of his voice as soothing in its own way as the rhythm of the rain. "-- Really, what was he thinking letting you out of the infirmary so soon anyway, with broken ribs and who knows what other injuries --"

"Rodney, I am fine." She finally interrupted him, "Dr. Beckett says my ribs are only bruised, not broken, and my knee is only mildly sprained. I have had many worse injuries before."

"Well, of course. I know that." He backed away from the bed, suddenly, abruptly tense, "it's just that I'm not usually quite so familiar with how you got each and every one. Usually I'm off getting bruises of my own not -- " he gestured vaguely, a wave of his hand that could have meant nothing or anything "--not like today." Not held with his own gun to his head while the Mirani guards struck her, threatened to do worse if he did not help them complete the weapon he could not -- would not let them build.

They had been caught by surprise, outnumbered and separated from the rest of their team. Their only option had been to bluff, try to stall the Mirani scientists and wait for Ronon and Colonel Sheppard to return with reinforcements.

She suppressed a shudder at the memory of how helpless she had felt, unable to fight back without risking Rodney's life as well as her own, his safety as much hostage to her behavior as she was to his.

Rodney squared his shoulders and opened his mouth to speak again. There was a determined tilt to his chin, but his eyes, always so expressive, showed his uncertainty and something strangely close to fear. This, then was what he'd come to say to her. "Teyla, I --" he started.

"Rodney, wait," she held a hand up, stopping him before he could begin. "I cannot let you apologize to me. None of what happened today was your fault."

"No, no, of course not," he waved a hand airily, but his laughter sounded forced. "That's not what I was going to say at all. I had no way of knowing those so-called scientists would be so brain-dead as to think it would be a good idea to bolster their nuclear bomb with a ZPM. And it's definitely not my fault they took so badly to being told exactly how insanely stupid that is. Seriously, that thing would have taken out a hive ship sure, along with half the planet. I just wanted to --" he shrugged, his earlier awkwardness back in full. "I just wanted to thank you, that's all. I'm not sure I could have held out without you there."

"I'm sorry. I do not think I understand." Of all the things she had thought he might want to say to her, that he might have come to her room to thank her had never crossed her mind. She had done nothing to deserve his thanks, nothing but stay still and wait for rescue, as helpless as he had been.

"Not that it was easy watching those thugs beat on you. I don't mean that! Just, there was a moment right before Sheppard and Ronon showed up with the cavalry, when I really thought about just giving up and fixing it for them in exchange for an escort off the planet before they tried the damn thing," he started pacing as he spoke, back and forth along the side of her bed. "But then I looked across the room and you were standing there with your eye already starting to bruise up and your ribs almost certainly hurting like hell and you looked so confident, like a queen, like those two brutes at your elbows were only holding you at your sufferance. And I just couldn't, I couldn't --" he stuttered to a halt, words failing him. And of all the shocks of this day that was perhaps the most surprising of all, that Rodney McKay would find himself at a loss for words.

Rodney's pacing had brought him close to the head of the bed and Teyla twisted herself so her legs were on the ground again, so she could stand up and pull him toward her. "I understand," she said softly and closed her eyes, pulling him down until their foreheads touched, slipping a hand behind his neck to hold them together.

With her eyes closed, her other senses were sharpened, and she found herself noticing the smell of his soap, fresh and clean and the feel of his breath, warm against her neck. It surprised her to realize she found the scent of him comforting, familiar for all she had never consciously noticed it before.

She opened her eyes and found him looking at her, his eyes startlingly blue so close up and in them she saw all the words he could not say. Tilting her head she leaned a bit further in and kissed him once, lightly on the lips.

He gasped into her kiss, the sound loud in the sudden silence between them. Stepping back, he raised one hand carefully to her face. His touch was gentle, calloused fingers tracing lightly across the bruised skin around her eye, a fleeting brush of a thumb over her lips. He slid his hand down her neck and then stopped, hand resting over her collarbone, his face a mix of desire and uncertainty.

She reached out, a mirror image of his touch, slid her free hand up, cupping his cheek.

"Teyla, I--" his voice cracked and she pulled him forward, silencing his words with another kiss, nothing light or uncertain about this one. He stayed frozen for a moment, eyes wide, and then he was kissing her back, still almost impossibly gentle. She pulled him closer, deepening the kiss, and it was like a switch had been flipped, like suddenly he realized that this was happening, that it was real. Hands clutching at her shoulders, he pulled her forward, trailing open-mouthed kisses down her neck.

She couldn't hide a hiss of pain, even as she tilted her head to give him better access.

He jumped back as if scalded. "I'm sorry, you're hurt, of course. I should go." Rodney looked around wildly, as if he'd suddenly forgotten which direction the door was. Perhaps he had. "Anyway, yes, I just wanted to say thank you and make sure you were alright and you are so I'll go now. Yes. So, good night." He didn't stop moving as he spoke, edging towards the doorway.

"Rodney. Wait." Teyla stepped forward, wincing as she came down heavily on her injured knee. "Stay, please."

Rodney stopped, his face slowly breaking into a crooked, cautious grin. "Really?"

Teyla nodded, holding his gaze. "Really. I would not start what I had no intention of finishing. Besides," she smiled, "it would seem I need someone to help me back to bed again."

She fell asleep with her head on Rodney's chest, his heartbeat firm and solid beneath her ear and she didn't miss the sound of the rain at all.


End file.
